EDITORIAL: Reshaping Rick Scott for 2014

Published: Friday, January 25, 2013 at 05:42 PM.

Gov. Rick Scott said two things this week that were guaranteed to rankle his conservative supporters. One was that he wants to give every Florida schoolteacher a $2,500 raise. The other was that Florida can afford the pay raises because the state’s economy is humming along.

This isn’t the message a lot of Republicans want to hear. But it’s the message Rick Scott may feel is necessary if he wants to be re-elected in 2014.

Remember when, just a couple of years ago, the governor approved a budget that cut school spending by $1.3 billion? Remember when he signed legislation requiring school systems to adopt “merit pay” plans linking teacher pay to test scores? Well, that was then. Now, he says, his proposed budget for 2013 will include $480 million to give raises to full-time teachers in kindergarten through 12th grade.

Republican legislators were stand-offish. House Speaker Will Weatherford told The Associated Press he might want to somehow tie the raises to the merit pay system.

But the governor seems sold on his idea. “We had to make tough choices to get our economy back on track,” he said Wednesday. “When the economy comes back, we can invest more.”

Notice the past-tense “had.” The tough choices were back then, in the past. The economy is better now.
That kind of talk annoyed Mitt Romney’s people during last year’s presidential campaign. The Republican candidate didn’t like the Republican governor of Florida telling everybody the Sunshine State’s economy was no longer in crisis. It spoiled the GOP line that the economy EVERYWHERE was a wreck.

So why is Gov. Scott stepping on his party’s favorite talking points?

For the same reason he’s been saying lately that Florida should bring back the early-voting days the Legislature slashed — although he once supported the reduction in early voting. He’s trying to reinvent himself as a moderate, the sort of fellow who wants to make voting easier and teachers happier. Expect more flip-floppery in the coming months.

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Gov. Rick Scott said two things this week that were guaranteed to rankle his conservative supporters. One was that he wants to give every Florida schoolteacher a $2,500 raise. The other was that Florida can afford the pay raises because the state’s economy is humming along.

This isn’t the message a lot of Republicans want to hear. But it’s the message Rick Scott may feel is necessary if he wants to be re-elected in 2014.

Remember when, just a couple of years ago, the governor approved a budget that cut school spending by $1.3 billion? Remember when he signed legislation requiring school systems to adopt “merit pay” plans linking teacher pay to test scores? Well, that was then. Now, he says, his proposed budget for 2013 will include $480 million to give raises to full-time teachers in kindergarten through 12th grade.

Republican legislators were stand-offish. House Speaker Will Weatherford told The Associated Press he might want to somehow tie the raises to the merit pay system.

But the governor seems sold on his idea. “We had to make tough choices to get our economy back on track,” he said Wednesday. “When the economy comes back, we can invest more.”

Notice the past-tense “had.” The tough choices were back then, in the past. The economy is better now.
That kind of talk annoyed Mitt Romney’s people during last year’s presidential campaign. The Republican candidate didn’t like the Republican governor of Florida telling everybody the Sunshine State’s economy was no longer in crisis. It spoiled the GOP line that the economy EVERYWHERE was a wreck.

So why is Gov. Scott stepping on his party’s favorite talking points?

For the same reason he’s been saying lately that Florida should bring back the early-voting days the Legislature slashed — although he once supported the reduction in early voting. He’s trying to reinvent himself as a moderate, the sort of fellow who wants to make voting easier and teachers happier. Expect more flip-floppery in the coming months.